“It’s the economy, stupid.” That was the constant refrain of strategist James Carville when talking to staffers on the Clinton campaign back in 1992. Thirty years on, it remains decent advice to political aides. As Liz Truss is discovering, if voters believe the economy is heading in the wrong direction, the incumbents usually get the blame. The banking crisis of 2007 to 2009 was the major factor behind Gordon Brown’s defeat in 2010. But he’s far from the only example. A study by political scientists of the impact of that crisis on elections in 30 European countries suggests that whether a government is of the left or the right does not matter. Whoever you are, sitting in the hot seat during an economic crisis burns.
But how fair is this? Are governments really the ones in control anyway? That depends on what you mean by control. In a country like Britain, being an economic policymaker is more akin to sailing a boat than driving a car. A government can tack and trim with a greater or lesser degree of skill, but in the final analysis it cannot change the direction of the wind. Sometimes politicians get lucky and other times they do not. Sometimes they don’t just mess up the setting of their sails but needlessly put a hole in the hull.
